Jose Santacruz Londono

Jose Santacruz "Don Chepe" Londono (1 October 1943-5 March 1996) was a Colombian drug lord and a leader of the powerful Cali Cartel.

Biography
Jose Santacruz Londono was born in Santiago de Cali, Colombia on 1 October 1943, and he co-founded the Cali Cartel with Gilberto and Miguel Rodriguez Orejuela during the 1970s. They were primarily involved with marijuana trafficking, but they branched out into cocaine during the 1980s, supplying 70% of the United States and 90% of Europe. Nicknamed "Don Chepe", Santacruz led the cartel's operations in the USA from New York City, where he smuggled ether (a vital resource in cocaine production) out of the country in gas canisters; because gas was toxic, it would not be checked at customs in Colombia. In 1994, Santacruz and two of his associates carried out the Queens hair salon shooting, in which they killed several Dominican gangsters who were competing with them over the ether export business. In 1995, the cartel came under immense pressure from the Colombian authorities, and he was arrested on 4 July 1995. He escaped from the La Picota prison in Bogota on 11 January 1996, and he planned to assassinate important government figures. However, he was tracked down to a shopping mall by police, and he was killed when the police stopped his car as he attempted to flee.